WARNING to End Date Compers - Missing Out on Comps

One-Eye

With Search not having worked properly for 5 days now, End Daters are starting to miss out badly. 
I have added the following to the Site Feedback fault report:

One-Eye said:

Fault still exists and is getting worse

Compers are split into two main groups - those who enter when comps are posted and those who enter when comps near the end date. End Date compers have been suffering since the new forum launched due to the inability to sort the forum by description/end date. This is something on the list of forum improvements needed.

Without this sorting feature, End Date compers have been forced to use the Search Facility to find comps ending on the relevant date. Now that Search is failing to find any comps posted since the evening of 26/02, End Date compers have no way to get to the relevant comps at all. 

For example - today (Monday 2nd), an end date comper may be trying to enter competitions that end on Wednesday 4th. With no sorting facility and Search failing, competitions such as E: 04/03 Win a Citizen Watch of your choice up to £500 (Rugby Try vote) are impossible for end daters to enter, and they are missing out.

grannybiker

Was going to start a new thread, but maybe best to include this issue here.
Using this link and asking for all comps E: 03/03 within last 6 months https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/search?adv=1&search=&title=E%3A+07%2F02&author=&cat=72&tags=&discussion_d=1&within=6+months&date=today

Brings up more than 100 pages and are really random, E: 28/03 13/03 etc. This is the first time this has happened, but yet another huge hurdle. I simply can't comp like this   Does anyone have a solution, please?
Just realised a comp I posted earlier is probably a dupe too if no comps posted since 26/02 are showing. 

One-Eye

Hi GB, You can shorten your 03/03 search to:
https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/search?adv=1&title=%2203%2F03%22&cat=72&discussion_d=1
All the other stuff is irrelevant - especially the within 6 months bit.

Just to explain - after the "?" the sections are:
adv=1 (means the search boxes are shown above the search results, miss it out and you just get search results)
title=%2203%2F03%22 (means it just searches just the titles, %22 is " and %2F is / so here you search titles for "03/03". Ignore the "E: " bit to make sure you find comps with misformatted titles. Using " means it must exactly match 03/03 - all the other 28/03 and 13/03 results you got are due to missing out the ")
cat=72 (this specifies just the main comps forum - ignoring game over etc)
Discussion_d=1 (means it returns the first post only and does not show replies)

Of course, due to the current fault any comp posted after the evening of Wednesday 26/02 will not be found at all.

Mariobug25

Been using another forum while this dogs dinner is getting sort (if)!!! 

I_Love_comps

Use the purple search button and type in comps E:2/03. It brings all the ones that end today. I am using a  laptop 

thingamaBob

@I_Love_comps Do you mean type in E: 02/03? If you include the word comps it brings up all sorts of results. If you don't put in the space and omit the 0, it also includes all sorts of results. If you just enter E: 02/03, yes, it does return lots of comps ending today but none that have been posted after 26/02. It also includes duplicates where there has been replies unless you deselect Replies and Polls.

One-Eye

Search is now ignoring 25% of comps

(2398 live comps on the forum, 590 posted since the fault started)

grannybiker

One-Eye said:

Hi GB, You can shorten your 03/03 search to:
https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/search?adv=1&title=%2203%2F03%22&cat=72&discussion_d=1
All the other stuff is irrelevant - especially the within 6 months bit.

Just to explain - after the "?" the sections are:
adv=1 (means the search boxes are shown above the search results, miss it out and you just get search results)
title=%2203%2F03%22 (means it just searches just the titles, %22 is " and %2F is / so here you search titles for "03/03". Ignore the "E: " bit to make sure you find comps with misformatted titles. Using " means it must exactly match 03/03 - all the other 28/03 and 13/03 results you got are due to missing out the ")
cat=72 (this specifies just the main comps forum - ignoring game over etc)
Discussion_d=1 (means it returns the first post only and does not show replies)

Of course, due to the current fault any comp posted after the evening of Wednesday 26/02 will not be found at all.

Thank-you so much   I wish I knew what happened in the last 24 hours as the link I was using, just changing the date, was working fine, although I didn't realise search was missing so many comps    
Do you think the powers that be are ever going to address compers' concerns? I'm rapidly losing faith... This makes me sad, as I've really enjoyed being an active member of the MSE comping community  

mjm3346

Search was supposed to be better with the new forum - it turns out to be no more reliable than the old one but it is  much more effort to use it - I didn't end date any way but I don't bother with it for anything now.

serenity2012

I thought there were just a lot fewer comps. I do all comps as they come but also every also end date search in case have missed any and have noticed after only 3 little pages it goes into game over comps and i know particularly on Fridays there should be a lot more on the forum. Too much for me now. It's supposed to be fun not stressful. Loquax is much better at the moment for end date searching. Just click on comps ending soon and it will bring up those ending on the day you search.

One-Eye

Update at 09:37am Wednesday 4th March

MSE_Ben_H said:

Hi everyone,
We are aware of the issue and still working it through. We appreciate when things are flagged up bust rest assured it's on our list (at the top). Though it doesn't always appear to be, search is very complex so we want to make sure that when we fix things, it doesn't introduce further bugs for other search queries or behaviours.
If anything new arises, please do let us know but want to reassure everyone we're aware of this particular issue and it is being worked on.
Thanks for your patience and sorry that it's happening in the first place.
Ben